Men’s Volleyball Rebounds with Saturday Sweep

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Less than 24 hours after a loss to a nationally ranked opponent, Regis College came right back and swept Dean College, 3-0 (25-16, 25-10, 25-16), Saturday afternoon in a neutral-site men's collegiate volleyball contest at the Wildcat Center on the campus of Johnson & Wales University.

Inelson Alves (Brockton, Mass.) led the Pride offensively with eight kills and a .462 hitting percentage, while Drew Beimel (Redondo Beach, Calif.) finished with seven kills, three service aces, and seven defensive digs. Jayson Vega (Ponce, Puerto Rico) collected 13 assists, and Brendan Lam (Rockville, Md.) added 11 assists. Fernando Gomez (San Juan, Puerto Rico) led the team with four service aces, while Zabdiel Frias (Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico) paced the Pride defense with 11 digs.

Lam earned consecutive service aces at the start of the match as Regis scored the first three points and eventually pulled out to a 10-3 advantage. Dean rattled off three straight points twice in the first set to close to within four, but the Pride held off the Bulldog rally, scoring five of the final six points of the set, capped by a service ace from Beimel.

In the second set, Regis started to pull away thanks to a 7-1 scoring run, led by two kills from Gomez. The Pride finished off the middle set with an 11-3 scoring stretch, punctuated by a service ace from Nathan Asstafan (Woonsocket, R.I.) and a kill by Beimel.

Dean (1-6) scored five straight points early in the third set, led by a kill and a service ace from John Kauffman, to open a 6-3 lead, but Regis quickly responded with a 10-1 scoring run, led by three kills from Alves and two kills from Beimel. The Bulldogs closed to within five at 19-14 on kills by Kauffman and Chadd Pelletier, but the Pride would close out the set and the match with a 6-2 scoring run, featuring three more kills from Alves.

Kauffman led the Dean offense with five kills, plus he earned five digs, while Aaron Rivers led the Bulldog defense with seven digs. However, Regis finished ahead of Dean in every statistical category, including kills (31-9), service aces (13-2), digs (35-21), and team blocks (3-1).

Regis (5-5) returns to conference play with three GNAC road matches in the span of eight days, starting Wednesday, Feb. 20, at Rivier starting at 7 p.m.